11/26/2007

The LiveJournal group Fans for WGA / wga_supporters has launched a "call the big wigs" campaign. They've really thought it out and written a very polite script for fans who want to call the heads of the big six companies.

"On Monday the WGA and AMPTP will recommence negotiations. The FFWGA wishes them Godspeed. However, our support cannot waver. I must stress: we will not stop campaigning on the writers’ behalf until the contract is signed, sealed, delivered, and serenaded by Stevie Wonder."

We're honored by the passion of this group and thrilled that they're articulating the issues in a POSITIVE way. Check it out.

9 comments:

You'll be happy to know that this morning when we called, they were taking actual messages. This evening, they're punting us to voice mail. I get the impression they got rather more phone calls today than expected. :)

Today we stepped things up a bit and have been putting pressure on the smaller networks to lean on the 'playas' on the AMPTP negotiating committee to pay up for the writers services already.

I am personally amused by the idea of the heads of smaller subsidiary networks (Comedy Central or USA/Sci Fi being 3 examples) passing the word up the line that they're annoyed that the viewers and fans are annoyed and that they don't like being in the middle of this mess and that it should be cleaned up already.

Oh and if you want to speak to a live person it's best to call between 9am and 5pm Eastern for the East Coast numbers or 9am and 5pm Pacific for the West Coast numbers. About 2/3rds of the time today I reached a live person...the only place that seems to be excessively voice-mail happy is NBC. Not that that deters us though, because sometime they will have to clean out the voice mail boxes.

One way or another we viewers and fans are going to get heard on this issue and we're certainly not siding with a bunch of rich pikers.

If you watch TV you're welcome to join the fun described at http://community.livejournal.com/wga_supporters/108254.html

darn it! i must pay attention! i missed thisbut I was busy buying theater tickets to see Scott Bakula in DC (I'll have lots of time, since there won't be any TV)

next time, advance warning would be cool. (though I can barely find a show to call Les Moonves about -I've been deliberately avoiding CBS/UPN/CW since Veronica Mars ended (I'd love to say "since Enterprise ended, but...)

I just wanted to say that I just called for Jeff Zucker at NBC and actually spoke to someone in his office. I said my piece, all in favor of the writers, and the woman was actually very nice, said she would certainly pass my message to Mr. Zucker, and sincerely thanked me for calling. I was expecting to go to voicemail, so I was a little surprised when an actual person answered, and the person was actually nice and sincere. Maybe it was all BS, but I feel better.

For a good reason to call CBS call on behalf of the blog http://www.lateshowwritersonstrike.com...if even one joke there makes you laugh, then Les Moonves ought to hear from you about how those funny talented guys need to get paid for their work. And if you want to complain about what happened with Veronica Mars go ahead...they ought to know that you're not watching their network and why.

@lorelei We <3 you assistants...without you we wouldn't have any TV shows and films to watch. We hate like hell that we have to unload on you (and I've asked fans to be as polite about this as they can) and are in accord that your bosses aren't the good guys here so that's why we're calling.

@beccaHave you posted about your ABC experience to the thread over at wga_supporters? I didn't get around to calling ABC yesterday but they're on my list for today.

I am not a member of the guild nor am in anyway connected with the film or television business but I am a proud member of the Communications Workers' of America (CWA) in Ohio and fully support what you are all doing.

I just wanted to let you all know that I called into NBC and was able to speak with a live person yesterday and they listened to what I had to say and stated that they as well would like to see things resolved and thanked me for my comments.

I spread the word around to the brothers and sisters in my Local to hopefully add support.

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